| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Roads of Destiny by O. Henry: those who would win her favour. Five cents was his capital, and this
he must risk against the chance of winning what lay within the close
grasp of the youngster's chubby hand. It was a fearful lottery,
Chicken knew. But he must accomplish his end by strategy, since he had
a wholesome terror of plundering infants by force. Once, in a park,
driven by hunger, he had committed an onslaught upon a bottle of
peptonized infant's food in the possession of an occupant of a baby
carriage. The outraged infant had so promptly opened its mouth and
pressed the button that communicated with the welkin that help
arrived, and Chicken did his thirty days in a snug coop. Wherefore he
was, as he said, "leary of kids."
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Hellenica by Xenophon: better than to abide by our ancestral laws and institutions, to be
free and independent citizens; but if aid from without is going to
fail us, we too must follow the rest and coalesce with the Olynthians.
Why, even now they muster no less than eight hundred[16] heavy
infantry and a considerably larger body of light infantry, while their
cavalry, when we have joined them, will exceed one thousand men. At
the date of our departure we left embassies from Athens and Boeotia in
Olynthus, and we were told that the Olynthians themselves had passed a
formal resolution to return the compliment. They were to send an
embassy on their side to the aforesaid states to treat of an alliance.
And yet, if the power of the Athenians and the Thebans is to be
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Mysterious Island by Jules Verne: latter to be supplied with long-range rifles, they on their side did not
believe themselves to be exposed. Quite uncovered, therefore, they surveyed
the islet, and examined the shore.
Their illusion was of short duration. Ayrton's and Gideon Spilett's
rifles then spoke, and no doubt imparted some very disagreeable
intelligence to two of the convicts, for they fell backwards.
Then there was a general helter-skelter. The ten others, not even
stopping to pick up their dead or wounded companions, fled to the other
side of the islet, tumbled into the boat which had brought them, and pulled
away with all their strength.
"Eight less!" exclaimed Pencroft. "Really, one would have thought that
The Mysterious Island |
